Holland Festival 1959

Dick Elffers designed many posters for the Holland Festival. His designs are in a vivid, rather primitive expressionist style. His methods were traditional in character. Elffers painted or stuck his sketches onto card. This design, created from torn or cut-up pieces of paper, was subsequently transferred onto a zinc plate. The printer made an outline drawing for each individual printed piece, which was then printed as a mirror image on the plate and coloured by Elffers. This was a labour-intensive process that required great skill. This poster consists of bright blocks of colour that sometimes overlap. They may be interpreted as a musical staff. The scroll end of a violin is painted over these blocks in thick, black strokes of paint, as a reference to the musical programme of the Holland Festival. The typewriter-style lettering was very fashionable in the late 1950s.